October

British Energy, the biggest power company in Great Britain, reaches an agreement with its creditors that will allow the government to bail the company out in order to avoid a bankruptcy filing.

The U.S. Border Patrol reveals that 151 people died while attempting to cross illegally into the U.S. from Mexico at the border with Arizona during the fiscal year that just ended; this number is the most in one year and six more than in the previous fiscal year.

Some 900 trade-union members and activists in the Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride, demonstrating for change in U.S. immigration law and amnesty for illegal immigrants, arrive in Washington, D.C., after stops in dozens of cities throughout the country.

Israel approves a plan to expand the project to wall off the West Bank from Israel to include barriers built well into the West Bank that will protect several Jewish settlements.

Dutch cyclist Leontien Zijlaard-Van Moorsel rides 46.065 km (28.623 mi) in Mexico City to beat the world hour record set by Jeannie Longo in 2000.

October 2

The Nobel Prize for Literature is awarded to J.M. Coetzee of South Africa.

In Rwanda’s first multiparty legislative elections since independence, the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front wins the majority of seats.

Some 70,000 people demonstrate in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, against a power-sharing agreement; the demonstrators believe that power should remain with the government and not be shared with rebels.

The fourth consecutive day of protests against a plan to export natural gas to the U.S. shuts down all transportation into and out of La Paz, Bol.

October 3

The George Bush Presidential Library Foundation announces that the 2003 recipient of the George Bush Award for Excellence in Public Service will be liberal U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy.

The World Health Organization reports that by using newer diagnostic tests, Taiwan has lowered the number of people who contracted SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) during the outbreak from 665 to 346, with only 37, rather than 180, deaths.

During a popular magic act featuring white tigers and lions in Las Vegas, Nev., Roy Horn of the duo Siegfried and Roy is attacked and critically injured by one of the tigers; the following day a man is found to have been keeping a Bengal tiger in an apartment in a housing project in New York City.

October 4

A suicide bomber attacks a crowded restaurant in Haifa, Israel, killing at least 19 people and injuring 50.

Oman for the first time holds elections in which all citizens are eligible to vote; the elections are for the Consultative Council, which serves in an advisory capacity.

Iraq’s central bank unveils new dinar notes, to go into circulation on October 15; the new notes, which feature Iraqi scenes rather than portraits of Saddam Hussein, are part of an attempt to stabilize Iraq’s currency and reduce counterfeiting.

October 5

Israel conducts an air raid in Syria for the first time in 30 years, hitting a site outside Damascus that Israel asserts, and Syria denies, is a terrorist training camp.

Elections are held in the breakaway Russian republic of Chechnya; the hand-picked incumbent and winner, Akhmad Kadyrov, faces almost no opposition and is backed by heavy-handed intimidation.

In the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, the most prestigious Thoroughbred horse race in Europe, the winner is Dalakhani; he had previously won the French Derby.

October 6

The Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine is awarded to Paul C. Lauterbur and Sir Peter Mansfield for their work that led to the development of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).

Maulana Azam Tariq, a hard-line Sunnite politician and member of the National Assembly of Pakistan, is assassinated in Islamabad.

October 7

The Nobel Prize for Physics is awarded to Alexei A. Abrikosov and Vitaly L. Ginzburg for their theoretical work on the nature of superconductivity and to Anthony J. Leggett for his work on the superfluid behaviour of the isotope helium-3.

Voters in California choose to recall Gov. Gray Davis and install movie star Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor in his stead.

October 8

The Nobel Prize for Chemistry is awarded to Roderick MacKinnon, for having deduced the molecular structure of ion channels in cell membranes and to Peter C. Agre for his discovery of aquaporins, membrane channels that convey water, while the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences goes to Robert F. Engle and Clive W.J. Granger.

India’s National Anti-Malaria Programme reports an alarming upsurge in cases of dengue fever, with the number of infected in the vicinity of 5,000 and 78 deaths; Kerala state is bearing the brunt of the epidemic.

Transparency International for the third year in a row names Bangladesh the most corrupt country in the world; the least corrupt is Finland.

October 9

In Baghdad, Iraq, a car bomb explodes in a police compound in a Shiʿite slum, killing at least 8 people and wounding 40, and, on the other side of town, a diplomat at the Spanish embassy is assassinated at his home.

A British High Court judge denies a claim by islanders and their descendants for monetary compensation for having been forced by the British government to leave their homes on Diego Garcia between 1967 and 1973; Diego Garcia is now a U.S. military base.

The Liberty Bell is moved to its home in the newly built Liberty Bell Center in Philadelphia in time for ceremonies dedicating the building in the year of the 250th anniversary of the casting of the bell.

October 10

The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to Iranian lawyer and human rights activist Shirin Ebadi; the committee cites her work on behalf of women and children.

The Chad-Cameroon Oil Development and Pipeline Project is officially inaugurated in a ceremony in Kome, Chad, attended by the presidents of Chad and Cameroon; the pipeline will carry oil from wells in Chad to ports in Cameroon.

Norwegian driver Petter Solberg wins the world rally championship when he comes in first at the Rally of Great Britain.

October 11

A gala celebration and opening-night concert featuring Itzhak Perlman and a world premiere by Jonathan Holland marks the opening of the new home of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, the Max M. Fisher Music Center.

October 12

A car bomb explodes in Iraq outside the Baghdad Hotel, which is used by members of the Iraqi Governing Council as well as Americans; 6 Iraqi security guards die, and at least 35 people are wounded.

Five protesters are killed in La Paz, Bol., after Pres. Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada calls in troops in an effort to restore order. (SeeOctober 17.)

Germany wins the Women’s World Cup in association football (soccer) when it defeats Sweden 2–1 in Carson, Calif.; the tournament had been moved from its planned venue in China because of fears of SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome).

The Royal Institute of British Architects announces that the Stirling Prize for 2003 goes to Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron for the Laban dance centre in London.

October 13

Saudi Arabia announces plans to hold municipal elections; these will be the first popular elections ever held in the country.

Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Hamad ibn Khalifah al-Thani officially opens Education City, an enormous project outside Doha that will contain branch campuses of the world’s leading universities and is intended to be a hub for the entire Middle East; it is due to be completed in 2008.

October 14

The Man Booker Prize for Fiction, Great Britain’s top literary award, goes to Australian writer DBC Pierre for his first novel, Vernon God Little.

Charles Gyude Bryant is sworn in as Liberia’s new transitional leader.

October 15

China joins the space race more than 40 years after it got under way as it launches its first manned space flight, from a base in the Gobi Desert; the Shenzhou 5 carries astronaut Yang Liwei into orbit around the Earth.

NATO formally inaugurates its new rapid-response force, which consists of 9,000 troops from all member countries and all branches of the service under a unified command; its first head is British Gen. Jack Deverell.

In elections in Azerbaijan, Prime Minister Ilham Aliyev is elected to succeed his father, Heydar Aliyev, as president.

Anglican church leaders from throughout the world gather in an emergency meeting in London called by Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury, in an effort to avoid a schism in the communion occasioned by the election of an openly gay bishop by the American province.

The Royal Swedish Academy announces that the winners of the Polar Music Prize, established in 1989, are B.B. King and Gyorgy Ligeti.

Jazz luminaries and politicians attend the opening ceremonies of the Louis Armstrong House in Queens, N.Y., where Armstrong lived from 1943 until his death in 1971; the National Historic Landmark has been renovated and serves as a museum.

October 16

Pope John Paul II officially celebrates 25 years on the Throne of Peter with a twilight mass in St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City.

The UN Security Council adopts a resolution that authorizes a multinational force to go to Iraq under the command of the U.S. and requires the Iraqi Governing Council to produce a timetable for a transition to democracy by December 15.

Tonga’s Legislative Assembly passes amendments to the country’s constitution, which dates from 1875, that increase governmental control over the media and increase the monarch’s power, which is already nearly absolute.

U.S. Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton signs an agreement that will divert water from the Colorado River away from farms in the Southwest toward large cities in southern California.

Patricia Ireland, a former president of the National Organization of Women, is dismissed just a few months after having been named CEO of the YWCA after her efforts to change the organization’s goals prove too divisive.

October 17

After days of increasingly passionate demonstrations against a government plan to export natural gas, Bolivian Pres. Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada announces his resignation; his vice president, Carlos Mesa, assumes the presidency. (SeeOctober 12.)

The German Bundestag (parliament) passes a much-needed but unpopular reform bill intended to bolster the economy and ease the country’s stubborn recession.

In Taipei, Taiwan, a topping-out ceremony is held for the skyscraper called Taipei 101; the building, scheduled for completion in late 2004, will replace Malaysia’s Petronas Towers as the tallest building in the world.

A fire breaks out in the 35-story Cook County Administration Building in downtown Chicago, and six people die of smoke inhalation in a stairwell, trapped by locked doors above and the fire below.

October 18

A Soyuz rocket takes off from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, carrying American C. Michael Foale, Russian Aleksandr Yu. Kaleri, and Spaniard Pedro Duque to the International Space Station to relieve the crew, who have been on the station for six months.

October 19

Tens of thousands of people gather in St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City to witness Pope John Paul II’s beatification of Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

American illusionist David Blaine, after having spent 44 days without food in a Plexiglas cube suspended near London’s Tower Bridge, is lowered to the ground and released before a large crowd; the stunt attracted a great deal of attention, not all of it favourable.

France’s Prix Goncourt is bestowed on Jacques-Pierre Amette for his novel La Maîtresse de Brecht.

October 22

Ukraine offers a show of force to prevent Russian workers from building a sea wall in the Kerch Strait, between the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea; the border between Ukraine and Russia in the strait has not been agreed upon.

After the killing of several international aid workers, the UN orders its staff in the self-declared republic of Somaliland in Somalia to remain in Hargeisa, the capital, and observe an early curfew.

The Nuna II, a solar vehicle designed by a Dutch team, wins the World Solar Challenge in Australia, covering the 3,010-km (1,870-mi) course in a record 30 hr 54 min.

October 23

The Walt Disney Concert Hall, designed by Frank Gehry, opens in Los Angeles; critics find it both architecturally and acoustically pleasing.

The first Russian military base in a foreign country since the end of the Soviet Union opens in Kyrgyzstan, only about 30 km (nearly 20 mi) from a U.S. base from which the U.S. stages operations in Afghanistan.

Algeria, Benin, Brazil, the Philippines, and Romania are selected as nonpermanent members of the UN Security Council.

U.S. government agents raid 60 Wal-Mart stores in 21 states, arresting at least 250 illegal aliens employed at the stores through outside contractors.

Two days after the start of the Grand Prix wildfire in southern California, hundreds of people are ordered to evacuate their homes; the fire, one of three in the area, has burned some 1,000 ha (2,500 ac) of the San Bernardino National Forest.

October 24

The final Concorde flights, for British Air, take off from Edinburgh and New York City; after their landing in London’s Heathrow Airport, the supersonic era of air transport is concluded.

U.S. officials say they have persuaded countries and institutions to contribute a total of $13 billion for the reconstruction of Iraq’s infrastructure; much of the pledged money is to be loaned, rather than donated.

October 25

The wild-card Florida Marlins defeat the New York Yankees in New York City 2–0 in the sixth game of the World Series to win the Major League Baseball championship; Marlins pitcher Josh Beckett is named series Most Valuable Player.

In response to a suit brought by a Muslim man whose sons attended an elementary school in L’Aquila, Italy, a judge rules that a crucifix should not be displayed in the classrooms of public schools, in spite of a 1923 law requiring them; public opinion is inflamed.

Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky, head of the Yukos oil company and reputed to be the wealthiest man in Russia, is arrested and charged with fraud and tax evasion.

In the Breeders’ Cup Classic Thoroughbred race at Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, Calif., previously underachieving Pleasantly Perfect outruns several big-name horses to win; earlier, in the Juvenile Fillies race, Julie Krone had become the first woman jockey to win a Breeders’ Cup race, riding Halfbridled to victory.

October 26

With the start of Ramadan, U.S. military forces lift the nightly curfew in Baghdad, Iraq, in order to accommodate observation of the Islamic fast.

A barrage of missiles strikes the Al-Rashid Hotel in Baghdad, Iraq, home to U.S. military officers; U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, in Iraq to highlight positive news stemming from the U.S. occupation, is a guest in the hotel but is unhurt.

The sixth annual Mark Twain Prize for American Humor is presented to Lily Tomlin in a ceremony at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.

October 27

A coordinated assault of suicide bombings in Baghdad, Iraq, targeting police stations and the Red Cross headquarters, kills at least 34 people and injures some 200.

Three states in Nigeria suspend a World Health Organization polio-immunization program on the grounds that there is widespread belief that the vaccine causes AIDS, cancer, and infertility.

Bank of America, which is under investigation for its role in the burgeoning mutual-funds mismanagement scandal, and FleetBoston Financial announce that they plan to merge to become the second largest American bank.

The Fukuoka Daiei Hawks defeat the Hanshin Tigers 6–2 in game seven to win the Japan Series baseball championship.

In response to a proposal from India to reestablish various links between the countries, Pakistan agrees to resume sports matches with India and to discuss air links, and it proposes to restore rail links and embassy staffs.

Australia announces plans to withdraw forces from the Solomon Islands, saying that its mission to restore order has been successfully accomplished.

After two years of searching, the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra announces that Neeme Jarvi will become principal conductor and music director.

October 29

One of the biggest solar storms ever recorded takes place, but in spite of widespread fears, very little disruption of electrical systems on Earth takes place.

Iain Duncan Smith is voted out as leader of the U.K.’s Conservative Party after two years of heading the Tories; he is replaced by Michael Howard on November 6.

Officials in New York City announce that they have removed 40 names from the list of victims killed in the World Trade Center in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, bringing the total down to 2,752.

It is reported that an important Mayan altar, stolen by looters from an archaeological site at Cancuén, Guat., has been recovered by a team of archaeologists working with undercover agents.

October 30

Italy’s highest court overturns the conviction of former prime minister Giulio Andreotti for conspiracy to murder a journalist.

A series of wildcat postal strikes bottle up mail delivery in Scotland and England, with downtown London especially affected.

Cooler, damper weather offers some relief in southern California, where wildfires have consumed 295,000 ha (729,000 ac) and more than 3,000 buildings, most of them houses; the death toll stands at 20.

October 31

Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir bin Mohamad, who is in many respects the father of the country, resigns, handing the reins of government to Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.

In spite of a warning from Russian Pres. Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister Mikhail M. Kasyanov publicly expresses his doubts about the wisdom of the freezing of shares of the Yukos oil company.

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